Twelve two-star mini-BOSSes, jet-black buds atop their emerald stems and leaves, thrashing about in a frenzy, giving off a hunger to bite and devour. Though it was merely a difference in color, these Dark Man-Eating Flowers were far more terrible than the Frenzied Man-Eating Flowers before them. Ye Tianxie scarcely paused at all and walked straight ahead. The same shape and the same skill meant the same attack range and attack method; though their attack strength was greatly raised and a terrible poison property tacked on, none of that could come into play at all if they couldn’t land a hit — which made them no different from the Frenzied Man-Eating Flowers before them.
Using the exact same tactic, without a single hitch, all twelve Dark Man-Eating Flowers toppled over. Together they launched six attacks, and not one touched Ye Tianxie’s body… In truth, had they managed to touch him even once, Ye Tianxie’s trial journey would have ended right there. The Frenzied Man-Eating Flowers had failed to attack him, and the Dark Man-Eating Flowers had failed to attack him too… none of this was mere coincidence. Ye Tianxie’s judgment — precise to an infuriating degree — always let him dodge one deadly strike after another as if with a casual flick, while every blow he landed hard on their heels swept with perfect precision across all twelve flowers at once.
This flower formation, which should have raised the trial’s difficulty nearly twofold in one stroke, became instead — before Ye Tianxie — the very means by which he cleared these flowers at the fastest possible speed.
The Dark Man-Eating Flowers’ corpses piled into a heap, and Ye Tianxie turned them over to gather the spoils. This time, the twelve Dark Man-Eating Flowers contributed two Bronze pieces and two Steel pieces to him, along with a ground littered with potions and silver coins.
One-star mini-BOSSes had a very low respawn rate, and two-star BOSSes lower still, but every elite monster meant an extremely high drop rate. Elite mini-BOSSes, a rare sight in ordinary times, appeared here in the Abyss-tier trial ground in swarms, and so the gear so hard to come by ordinarily came rolling in as well… but only on the premise that you had the ability to defeat them.
“Ding… You have gathered ‘Dark Man-Eating Flower’s Pollen’ from the ‘Dark Man-Eating Flower.'”
“Ding… You have gathered ‘Dark Man-Eating Flower’s Pollen’ from the ‘Dark Man-Eating Flower.'”
“Ding…”
Dark Man-Eating Flower’s Pollen — Jet-black pollen from a Dark Man-Eating Flower, possessing a terrible toxicity.
The twelve Dark Man-Eating Flower corpses contributed twelve portions of Dark Man-Eating Flower’s Pollen in all. After reading over the brief attributes of this black pollen in earnest, Ye Tianxie grew thoughtful and carefully placed them into his backpack. He pushed open the stone gate and entered the next trial.
From crossing the first gate to finishing the second, he’d used less than two minutes in all… A result that, had others learned of it, would surely have been met with universal scorn… because no one would believe it in the first place.
Nearly every player who reached Level 10 would form a party and enter the Abyss-tier trial ground for that reward of immense, overwhelming appeal. But over half the parties were wiped out at the first gate; those who could pass it were, without question, elite parties among players, and the parties that could break past the second gate… those would be combinations of elites among elites. In ability, attributes, gear, and coordination with one another, they were beyond what ordinary players could reach. There were already several million Level 10 players in the Huaxia Region at this moment, but only three parties in all had passed the second gate of the Abyss-tier trial… and not one of those three had kept more than half its members after passing it… and the rest had all perished miserably at the third gate. The third gate had made these parties give up outright, without even entertaining a second attempt. Across the five consecutive gates of the trial, the third gate’s difficulty had already reached a degree that left them utterly despairing — what did they have to pass this Abyss trial with?!
Of these three parties, one belonged to the Divine Domain Pact, one to Wings That Shroud the Sky, and the other was known to no one.
And not one of them had cleared the first two gates in under an hour, their party sizes all a full twelve people.
And Ye Tianxie, alone, had broken through two gates in under two minutes… Say it aloud, and it would only be taken as a joke.
The third gate of the Abyss trial was where the abyss truly began.
The stone gate opened, and several oxen of especially enormous build came into view — twelve of them, still. The instant Ye Tianxie appeared, the twelve swaying great oxen looked toward him at the same time, then charged madly, as if they’d seen a mortal enemy they couldn’t share the sky with.
Beside the names hovering above their heads, three small golden stars hung on each.
Frenzied Fierce Ox — Level 10 three-star elite. HP: 2,500. Originally the most ordinary of oxen, it underwent a terrible mutation from eating too much feed laced with melamine and lean-meat agent, its temperament grown extremely violent, its build turned enormous and its body sturdy and powerful, gaining at the same time a monstrous strength far beyond its normal state; it will launch a savage charge at any foreign creature that draws near.
Skill — Savage Charge: Gathers its full strength to deliver a frenzied headbutt at the target, dealing massive damage with a high chance to knock the target down and inflict 2 to 3 seconds of stun; after each use, it falls into roughly 1 second of stalled immobility.
Special — Kidney Stone Flare-Up: During a Savage Charge, there is a 5% chance of triggering a long-standing kidney stone, slowing its movement and attack frequency and causing it to lose 5 HP per second for 3 minutes.
Twelve three-star elites — a combination absolutely impossible to encounter in ordinary times, and even if one truly did encounter it, all one could do was turn tail and leave, then summon a great crowd of people to besiege it together. But faced with the limit of parties of twelve at most, these twelve three-star elites became a chasm nearly impossible to cross… And at the same time, these twelve three-star elites likewise wouldn’t fall for the lure-them-over-one-at-a-time approach, because the instant Ye Tianxie appeared, every Frenzied Fierce Ox here charged him at once — which meant that the entire map of this third gate was within their aggro range. Unless every target was dead, they absolutely would not stop attacking, and would give a person no chance to catch their breath or exploit a loophole.
Back then, faced with a single three-star elite, the five well-equipped Red Leaf Pact members hadn’t been able to withstand it even together; with twelve people facing twelve three-star elites, one can well imagine how slim the hope of victory was. To say nothing of just one person.
But this person was one who had never lost — and could not afford to lose!
When the three nearest oxen charged before him, he’d already precisely calculated these oxen’s movement speed: between 78 and 82! Inferior to an ordinary player’s initial 100 movement speed.
“Hmph…” Ye Tianxie’s brow sank, his gaze shooting out almost tangibly at the oxen bearing down before him with their frenzied air. An ordinary player could solo a same-level one-star elite, but would struggle to defeat a same-level two-star elite, and soloing a same-level three-star elite was next to impossible. To fully defeat a three-star elite required a complete party… a defensive class to withstand the attacks, a support class to keep up healing and support, an output class to attack rapidly. If facing one alone… a mage class with the strongest attack power, for instance, would be struck dead in three hits at most facing a same-level three-star elite alone.
(End of Chapter 39)